Ultra running – Enjoy it when you can. Endure it when you need to

Tick -Tock

“Time is free….. but it’s priceless. You can’t own it…… but you can use it. You cant keep it…… but you can spend it”

“Time is the most precious commodity. It is the one thing you cannot get back and you cannot buy it. It is finite.”

“Time lost is never found again.”

“Time is precious………waste it wisely”

So there we have it. A few obligatory quotes about “time” (cos lets be frank here, it just wouldn’t be a blog from me unless I quoted someone else). But time is precious, to me, to you, and to each and everyone on this planet. It not only is ours to use but also uses us. Time decrees when we wake in the morning, when we eat lunch, when we are working, when we are with our loved ones, when we are relaxing, when we are doing. When we are not doing. We all to some degree or the other find ourselves dancing time’s jig.

I am no more or no less unique in the demands that Mistress Time asks of me. I work, shift work in what at times can be a stressful job. I am a Husband, a Father, and a Grandfather. My wife and I have 6 children between us ranging from 8 years old to 28 years old. We own horses, dogs, and rabbits. I am a Governor at our local village school. Nothing exceptional or unique in any or all of that.

However, I should also mention that my wife and my eldest daughter both have lifelong chronic illness’. I then have to mix in the fact that my youngest daughter has Autism and a recent secondary diagnosis of PDAS (Pathological Demand Avoidance Sydrome). The impact of these conditions combined with life’s routine and normal time demands leave me in a constant state of “juggling”. Juggling this appointment, that appointment, this hospital visit, that shift, the trip to football, childminding, cutting the grass, cooking dinner, etc, and so on. I now chuck in to the equation……..running. Participation in Ultra’s and the training for them, funnily enough requires a fair bit of running.

Having taken a break from the time demands that getting ready for an Ultra brings, but now being on the brink of returning to those same demands…………I am unsure exactly what my prep for Ham & Lyme in July next year will entail. I can however promise you that it will most probably be as sporadic and haphazard as all of my previous preparations.